


maybe you should learn to love her

by merricats_sugarbowl



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Thieves, Clarke and Lexa are cat burglars, F/F, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Feelings ensue, Getting Together, Injury Recovery, One Shot, Rivalry, They keep getting in each other's way
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-07
Updated: 2016-05-07
Packaged: 2018-06-06 23:46:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,117
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6775114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merricats_sugarbowl/pseuds/merricats_sugarbowl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“Who the hell are you?”</i>
</p>
<p>
  <i>The girl blinks at her. “I could ask you the same question,” she says, a challenge in her tone. “You’re the one who just climbed in through a window. Kind of sketchy, don’t you think?”</i>
</p>
<p>Lexa's a thief who never fails to retrieve her target, until a certain blonde with a penchant for picking locks wanders into her life and sparks a rivalry that threatens her perfect streak. Clarke just wants to know why Lexa seems to be everywhere she goes.</p>
<p>(Or, the Clexa cat burglar AU that I decided to write instead of studying.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	maybe you should learn to love her

**Author's Note:**

> I haven't posted in months, but as usual, when I'm avoiding work, I write Clexa AUs. Go figure. Title taken from Ed Sheeran's "Gold Rush."
> 
> I'm [here](http://spasmodictricksofradiance.tumblr.com) on Tumblr!

There’s no question about it — Lexa’s the best at what she does.

Her people call her the Commander. Lincoln’s the one who coined it, saying it with a smirk after her fifth successful job in a row. It’s a strange nickname for a cat burglar, more suited to the general of an army than a slight girl in her early twenties who spends her nights shimmying in and out of windows and picking locks. It made her uncomfortable at first, like she was somehow above the rest of the people at the firm, but she’s come to recognise it for what it is now. A code name. A signifier. She wears it with pride now, always answering it with a slight tilt of her chin and a narrowing of her eyes. In a way, it’s her trademark.

When people ask for the Commander, they know what they’re getting. Stealth is one of Lexa’s greatest talents; speed is another. She can be in and out of a building in five minutes, less if there’s no security system to manoeuvre. She doesn’t get held up by tricky questions of morality, either, so there’s no danger of her questioning a client about their motives. She knows who she is, knows what she is. She doesn’t try to pretend that she’s anything more.

She looks at each assignment as a challenge, a new puzzle to put together, a door to unlock. There’s a certain thrill that comes with working out the perfect way to get into a house undetected, a pleasant kind of shiver that accompanies the accomplishment of figuring out how to disable a particularly tricky alarm. Lexa’s job is one fuelled entirely by adrenaline. She gets drunk on it.

Tonight is a job that she’s been working on for weeks. She doesn’t know who the client is, but she knows the target extensively. She has to, to do her job right — part of being a successful thief involves knowing who your targets are and where they’re going to be at every minute of the day. Lexa’s staked out the address for days on end, painstakingly noting down the movements of its occupants, or rather, occupant.

It’s a big house in an affluent neighbourhood, dark grey stone with ivy climbing the walls and surrounded by wrought-iron gates. There’s a kind of grandeur to it that was entirely absent from Lexa’s childhood homes, and that would be entirely out of place in the little apartment that she rents now. The driveway is cobbled and there’s an honest to God fountain in the centre of it. The owner of the house is a politician, Dante Wallace, one whose face Lexa recognises from past campaigns. Dante Wallace is going a little pudgy around the middle, probably in his mid to late sixties, with white hair and a smile that looks kind, even from a distance. He spends most of his time promoting his image to the voting public, which, from what Lexa can tell, means doing a lot of ribbon cutting ceremonies and donating money to worthy causes. He goes for a long walk every Sunday morning. He gardens in his free time and wears his pyjamas when he’s fetching the paper.

These facts aren’t important to Lexa’s client, though. What’s important to the client is Dante Wallace’s art collection.

Somewhere inside that big, beautiful house is a painting that Lexa’s client wants for his own collection. Lexa’s not entirely sure why — she’s never been a huge art connoisseur — but he’s willing to part with a lot of money to make it happen, so she’s not going to criticise. Her job tonight is simple. Get into the house, get the painting, get away. It’s going to be easy; thanks to all of the time she’s spent camped outside of Wallace’s gates with her listening equipment, Lexa knows that the politician is away at a conference this weekend. The alarm system is surprisingly basic for this type of neighbourhood,one that Lincoln was able to disable remotely before Lexa left, so the only hurdle in sight is figuring out where exactly the painting is in the house. Lexa has a photograph of it, but no idea of where Wallace has chosen to display it.

Even without that information, she feels confident that everything’s going to go smoothly.

Anya’s her driver tonight and she’s parked a little ways down the block, just far enough away that nobody will be able to connect the car to the theft, if anyone notices Lexa sneaking around. She’s not concerned about that though — she knows these kinds of neighbourhoods, and she’s almost certain that by this time of night, most of its residents are asleep, dreams fuelled by sleeping pills and too many glasses of white wine. No one is watching the slim brunette girl strolling down the sidewalk, and even if they were, she’s not unusual enough to hold their attention for long.

Even so, she’s careful to keep her face in the shadows as she walks down the street, Wallace’s wrought-iron gates in sight. It doesn’t hurt to be careful.

This is by far the most dangerous part of this assignment. There’s no sneaky side entrance to the house, no back way in. The only way for Lexa to get onto the property is to climb over those intimidating gates, and while she does so, she’s vulnerable to anyone who might be watching. Her confidence wavers only momentarily and then she’s over the gates within seconds, making her way up to the front of the house.

The best way in is through a second storey window, so there’s more climbing to do, but Lexa’s no stranger to that. She climbs the wall with expert ease, using the ivy to anchor herself close to the bricks. She’s selected her point of entry carefully — the window she’s chosen leads to a guest room at the front of the house. That means that even if Lexa’s made a mistake (unthinkable) and Wallace is here, she can still make her way through the house unnoticed. Opening the window is the tricky part. Lexa has to lean forward enough to slide open the latch, and there’s a moment where she swings from the wall precariously, but then it’s done. The window slides open and Lexa clambers inside, landing on plush carpet without a sound.

She reaches into her pocket for the photograph of the painting and starts to examine the room around her, though it seems devoid of artwork. Nothing here, though she’s not really surprised. She didn’t think that she would be lucky enough to find it in the very first room that she entered. She moves onto the next room and the next, and a few minutes have passed before she finally stumbles upon the painting that her client is so intent on obtaining. It’s in a room that appears to be a study, taking pride of place above a mahogany desk with a leather backed chair. It’s not particularly impressive, just a lot of colours and shapes, but she’s not an art fan, after all. It could be the greatest masterpiece ever painted and Lexa wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.

She slides the painting carefully off of its hooks, staggering a little under the weight, and then reaches into her pocket for her phone.

“Anya,” she murmurs once the dial tone ends, “I’ve got it. Pull the car up.”

"You got it, Commander," comes the reply, a familiar chuckle coming down the line when Lexa tsks at the nickname.

She hangs up and starts to make her escape, though she’s a little worried now about making it out through the window with the painting — the canvas is a lot bigger than she expected, and she’s not entirely sure if she trusts herself to make it out the window and down the wall without damaging it in some way. She halts in the doorway of the study, taking a moment to consider her options.

Wallace isn’t here, she’s certain of that. Lexa’s study of him was extensive, she knows that she hasn’t slipped up — besides that, the house is dead silent. She bites her lip.

Usually, she wouldn’t even consider changing her escape route. Adding variables to a meticulously planned out assignment is too risky. But the painting is valuable. The deposit the client paid is enough to cover Lexa’s rent for the next year, and that’s before the bill is paid in full. Damaging it is out of the question.

The painting starts to slip from her hands and Lexa makes a decision.

She makes her way down the long hallway towards the staircase and then she creeps down it carefully, clutching onto the painting’s frame with one hand and the staircase with the other. The stairs seem to go on forever, but finally she reaches the last step, and then it’s only a few feet to the doorway. The exit is in sight, but just as she starts to head for the door, the unthinkable happens.

She hears a voice.

It’s a girl’s voice, light and melodious, coming from just outside the window. For a split second Lexa thinks that she’s been caught out, that it’s Wallace’s daughter and that she’s going to jail — but Wallace doesn’t have a daughter. He has a son, Cage, who Lexa’s sources tell her is currently attending university on the other side of the country. The girl outside could be a girlfriend, she supposes, but the voice sounds young, and Dante Wallace doesn’t seem like the sort to mess around with younger women. Only one thing is certain: whoever this mystery woman is, she’s blocking Lexa’s escape route.

There’s nowhere to hide in the stupidly grand entrance hall, but Lexa pauses to listen to the voice anyway, straining to hear what the girl is saying. The voice is muffled by the glass, so she can’t hear much, but a few words filter through as she hovers in the hallway.

“The gate… easy,” the girl is murmuring, but there’s no response; a phone call, maybe? “… Disabled. Nobody home… going in the front…”

Lexa’s eyes widen and she looks around for somewhere to hide, but she’s too late; the latch on the window pops and then it’s sliding up, and a girl with wavy blonde hair and a dark scarf tied over her mouth is climbing inside. Not a girlfriend, then — if Lexa’s not mistaken, what she’s looking at is someone on a mission like hers.

The girl doesn’t see Lexa at first, too intent on getting into the house. She’s still talking, muttering into a headset that sits askew on her waves. Lexa resists the urge to roll her eyes. Equipment like that is so _tacky_. Good old-fashioned cell phones, that’s what Lexa and her crew use, and it does them just fine. It occurs to her that questioning the girl’s choice of equipment may not be her best choice of action right now — she is, after all, clearly up to no good, standing in the middle of the hall with a very expensive painting clutched in her hands — but it’s not like there’s anywhere for her to go. The vast entrance hall is devoid of furniture, and all of the doors are too far away for her to run. In the absence of anything else to do, Lexa clears her throat.

The blonde girl looks up, startled, and her eyes widen comically.

“Who the hell are you?”

* * *

House jobs are Clarke’s least favourite.

Whenever a client wants something from a private property, it’s inevitably one of the oversized, too lavish McMansions that remind Clarke of where she grew up. Just walking along the tree lined streets and looking at the gates, the Roman style villas and the water features in the front yards, makes her feel sick to her stomach. Clarke’s childhood was not a happy one, to say the least, and she far prefers breaking into places of business than the homes of CEOs and trust fund babies.

But this is a big one, the biggest assignment she’s received yet, and the moment she saw what the client was willing to pay, she knew that she couldn’t turn it down.

Dante Wallace’s house is one of the more offensive ones on the block; he’s gone for the Grecian theme, all white marble and statues dotting the front yard, though Clarke spots an off-theme koi pond just past the gates. Clearly, Wallace has delusions of grandeur.

There’s a harsh crackling noise in her ear and she winces, adjusting the headset volume so that she’s no longer in danger of losing her hearing.

“Watch it, Jasper,” she hisses. Her voice is muffled by the scarf tied around her face, her own paranoid way of hiding her identity from anyone who might be watching. “Not so close to the mic. If you can’t handle it, give it back to Monty.”

“I can handle it,” he retorts, sounding wounded. “Are you at Wallace’s place?”

“I’m here. House is dead. He’s definitely not here.”

“Then you’ve got the go-ahead,” Jasper says. “Let’s be quick about it, Griffin. There’s a car circling the block that I don’t like the look of.”

Clarke rolls her eyes and hoists herself over the gate, landing on the other side more lightly than seems possible for a girl her size. She makes her way up to the front door, not bothering to check her surroundings; Wallace rarely leaves his home, but she knows for certain that tonight, he’s away at a conference. The only other person who could be in the house is his son, but he’s on the other side of the country. There’s nobody here but her.

As she’s fumbling with the window latch, the voice in her ear crackles again; Jasper wanting to know if she made it over the gate and if she’s inside the house yet. She likes Jasper, but he’s new to control, far too eager to know what’s going on. Clarke wishes he’d put Monty back on the line.

“The gate was easy,” she mutters. “Alarm system was already disabled, I guess Wallace forgot to arm it before he left. There’s definitely nobody home. I’m going in the front. I’ll report more when I’m inside, Jasper.”

He falls silent, though for how long, she’s not sure. For now, she just concentrates on picking the lock, a grin quirking at her lips beneath her scarf. There’s something so satisfying about cracking a lock open; it’s like solving a puzzle. Carefully, she slides the window upwards and clambers inside, taking care to land lightly on the marble tiles within.

“Alright, I’m inside,” she says, adjusting her headset and straightening up. Jasper says something on the other end, but Clarke doesn’t hear it — her attention is drawn instead by the sound of a throat clearing, and then she looks up to find a brunette girl dressed all in black staring at her, looking both amused and vaguely uncertain at Clarke’s sudden appearance. For a brief moment, Clarke is struck dumb; her surveillance on Wallace never mentioned a daughter, only an errant son, and his wife’s been dead for several years. Then her eyes flicker to the painting clutched in the girl’s hands, the vague glimmer of guilt that crosses her features, and she knows that just like her, this girl doesn’t belong in Wallace’s mansion. She narrows her eyes, cutting the mic on her headset. “Who the hell are you?”

The girl blinks at her. “I could ask you the same question,” she says, a challenge in her tone. “You’re the one who just climbed in through a window. Kind of sketchy, don’t you think?”

“You’re the one holding a one of a kind Dali,” Clarke retorts. “And getting fingerprints on the canvas, from the looks of things.”

The girl glances down and hefts the painting upwards, her fingers grasping at the frame instead. Her cheeks have turned pink at the accusation, but her face is defiant, unwavering. Maybe she doesn’t belong here, but she knows that Clarke doesn’t either.

“So,” the girl says, tilting her chin up. “It appears that we’ve reached an impasse.”

“It appears that we have.”

The girl starts suddenly and glances down at her pocket. “My ride’s here,” she says uncertainly, as if she and Clarke are parting after a trip to the movies, not a… whatever this is. The girl tilts her head to the side, questioning, and then says, sounding almost hopeful, “I won’t tell if you won’t.”

The thought of the two of them just parting ways seems ludicrous — how are they supposed to trust one another to stay quiet? Clarke wonders doubtfully how much faith she should put in the word of another thief.

But there’s an African fertility statue upstairs that Clarke’s client wants, and the brunette is the one at a disadvantage here; her face is uncovered, not carefully concealed like Clarke’s. If she does decide to talk, she’s not going to have a lot worth telling the police, but Clarke will have plenty to say. The thought of that should be enough to keep her quiet, at least. She finds herself nodding.

“It’s a deal.”

The brunette almost smiles and then she’s out the door, hefting the painting higher up in her arms as she leaves. Clarke watches her curiously, wondering at the chances of two thieves stumbling upon each other in the same house. She’s so caught up in her own thoughts that it takes a minute for her to realise that the headset is crackling again, Jasper’s voice ringing in her ear, shrill and panicked. She clicks the mic on.

“Clarke? What’s going on? That car from before is outside the gates, I think maybe it’s one of Wallace’s people—”

“It’s not Wallace,” Clarke says, cutting him off. “There was someone else here, a girl, but she’s gone now. She’s not a threat to us.” _I don’t think,_ she adds silently. She’s reasonably confident that the girl wouldn’t be able to identify her in a line up, not with the scarf covering her mouth. And besides, if she rats Clarke out, she’s ratting herself out, too.

“Are you sure?” Jasper says, frantic.

“I’m sure,” Clarke sighs. “Now what room is the statue in? This place gives me the creeps.”

She completes the assignment, as promised, and returns to the van to find a beaming Jasper, who informs her that he’s going to be running point on her next job, too. She can’t bring herself to be annoyed about it — as much as she hates to admit it, her thoughts are entirely occupied by the brunette. She wonders if their paths will cross again.

* * *

As it happens, Lexa runs into the blonde on her next assignment.

It’s a routine job, stealing some kind of important ledger from a law firm that has an unknown significance for Lexa’s client of the week. It’s a building she’s been in before. She knows all of the exit and entry points, and Lincoln’s an old pro with the alarm system, so there’s nothing to stop her from getting in and out without difficulty. When she lands, catlike, on the carpet of a fifth floor office, however, she hears rustling in the office next door that tells her she’s not alone.

She creeps into the hallway and peers furtively around the open office door, eyes alighting on a slim figure, dressed all in black, with a scarf drawn around the lower part of her head. She’s rifling through drawers, muttering quietly to herself. As Lexa watches, she retrieves a red folder from one of the drawers and holds it up, something like triumph flashing in her eyes.

With a sinking heart, Lexa realises that the blonde is holding the very same ledger that her client has tasked her with retrieving.

“Hey,” she hisses, stepping into the room. The blonde looks up and they lock gazes, recognition flashing at her from behind blue eyes. It seems as though she’s about to say something, but then a noise in the hallway makes both of them jump. Lexa turns her head sharply, looking for the source of the noise. It’s nothing, just a radiator clicking on for the night, but by the time Lexa turns her gaze back, the blonde girl is already pushing past her.

For the first time, Lexa fails to complete an assignment, and she finds herself more than a little irritated at the blonde for ruining her perfect streak.

They run into each other constantly over the next few weeks, so much so that Lexa can’t help but wonder if someone is purposely throwing the two of them together — it seems like the only possible explanation for the blonde constantly being given the same targets as her. Sometimes, they’re both seeking the same bounty, but more often than not it’s just something in the same building.

Lincoln explains it away by saying that most of the bigger targets in the city tend to be easy to break into for only a short time each month — the fact that Lexa keeps running into the blonde has less to do with fate, and more to do with the most valuable prizes being easier to steal at particular times.

Still, it doesn’t make it any less annoying. Neither do Lincoln’s pointed remarks about how Lexa only finds it annoying because she thinks the blonde is attractive. Lexa frequently chooses to ignore those remarks, although she has to admit that the blonde has spectacular hair, and those blue eyes of hers are striking even when they’re glaring, which they usually are, when Lexa’s around.

It seems as though the blonde finds it irritating, too. Each time she stumbles upon Lexa in a darkened building or by the back entrance of some nameless corporation, she narrows her eyes at her, and Lexa can always tell when she’s frowning behind that scarf of hers.

“What are _you_ doing here?” she exclaims in frustration, more than once.

Perhaps inevitably, they form a sort of rivalry. They trade barbs, mocking each other’s skills, competing to get their targets, each trying to prevent the other from completing her assignment. But despite all of this, even after several encounters with the blonde, Lexa still doesn’t know her name.

She does find herself looking out for her when she’s out on assignment, though. Soon, it’s part of her surveillance routine, seeing if the blonde is anywhere to be found, although she would never admit to it if anyone asked.

Tonight is a departure from her usual kind of assignments — instead of retrieving something, she’s been tasked with planting a folder inside a dental surgeon’s office. He’s currently locked in a custody battle over his five year old daughter, and Lexa suspects that this folder will be the nail in the coffin of the mother’s legal argument, but there’s no time for questioning herself about the morals of what she’s about to do. She wants to get in and out as soon as possible, and then get back to the peaceful calm of her own little apartment.

The office is on the fourth floor of the building. Lexa scales the walls with ease and finds a way in through a busted window, landing with soft feet inside a cramped bathroom. The folder makes a crinkling noise inside her jacket as she lands and she presses a hand to it, willing it to be quiet. Then she makes her way out of the bathroom and starts to creep down the hall, scanning the nameplates on each door that she passes.

She makes it to the office and plants the folder amidst some papers on the surgeon’s desk, and that’s her cue to leave. She’s padding back down the hallway to where she came in when she sees a flash of brightness in her peripheral vision, and she turns around to find the blonde, hard at work picking the lock of one of the office doors.

The rational part of Lexa’s brain tells her to ignore her and get a move on — she’s done what she came here to do, there’s no reason for her to stay. But just the sight of the other girl makes her skin prickle with irritation, and before she knows what she’s doing, she’s turning on her heel and walking back the way she came. The blonde hasn’t noticed her yet, too intent on breaking into the office, and her eyes turn wide with surprise when Lexa comes to a halt beside her.

“We really need to stop meeting like this,” Lexa deadpans, and the girl’s jaw twitches beneath her scarf.

“Leave me alone,” she hisses. “I have work to do.”

“Yeah, I can see that,” Lexa says, peering over the girl’s shoulder at her lock picking kit and wrinkling her nose. “You know that’s not gonna do it, right?”

“It’ll work,” the blonde says testily, turning back to her task. Lexa stays where she is, arms folded, observing with the kind of detached air that makes it seem as though she could succeed at the job effortlessly. When the lock fails to spring open after a few moments, the blonde drops her equipment in frustration, and then turns back to Lexa with familiar narrowed eyes. Surprisingly, she yanks her scarf down, revealing her face to Lexa for the first time — and it’s not a bad one at all. The girl is prettier than Lexa expected, though the scowl twisting her features does nothing to improve them. While Lexa is busy admiring the curve of her lips, the blonde crosses her arms. Her next words echo their first meeting. “Who the hell _are_ you?”

* * *

She’s here _again_ , and Clarke has just about reached the end of her tether. Initially, she found the brunette intriguing, but the more they run into each other, the more Clarke finds herself wanting to throttle her. She’s always ready with a sarcastic remark or that infuriating smirk of hers, and Clarke is sick of it. Frustrated, she tosses down her lock picking kit and yanks her scarf down, all the better to admonish the intruder.

“Who the hell _are_ you?” she bites out.

“Lexa,” the brunette supplies, and at last Clarke has a name to put to the face of the girl who seems to have been stalking her for the last few months. “Who the hell are _you_?”

For a moment, Clarke considers withholding the information, but there doesn’t seem to be much point in hiding things from her. They’ve ran into each other doing spectacularly shady things over the last few weeks. If Lexa was going to rat her out to the police, she would have done it by now.

“Clarke,” she says at last. The irritation in her voice has already faded; all she wants is to get back to the task at hand, preferably with Lexa’s eyes ( _her very green eyes_ , Clarke’s brain adds helpfully) not hovering on her. “Now, if you don’t mind, I have to—”

She’s cut off by the sound of a man’s voice, loud, obtrusive, and far too close to where she and Lexa are standing. There was supposed to be no one in the building tonight — Jasper and Monty assured her of that — but the voice is unmistakeable, and it’s headed their way. Worse still, it’s coming from the direction that Clarke came in, and she doesn’t know of any other exit points.

Her panic must show, because Lexa suddenly grips her arm and yanks her to her feet, gesturing rapidly towards a door at the end of the hallway. Relief surges through Clarke and she silently takes back every bad thing she’s ever thought about the other girl. She has a way out. She’s going to be okay. She stoops down to grab her lock picking equipment and then lets Lexa lead her down the hallway, the two of them moving as quickly and as silently as they can. The man’s voice is accompanied now by footsteps, getting louder and louder. They don’t have a lot of time if they want to avoid getting caught.

Just as Lexa’s opening the door, there’s the sound of another door opening at other end of the hallway, followed by an abrupt shout.

“Hey! Who’s there? What do you think you’re doing?”

“Hurry,” Clarke presses, but Lexa doesn’t need the encouragement. She throws open the door and races for the window, and then she’s up and out before Clarke has a chance to ask how she plans to get them out of here. Faltering, Clarke peers over the ledge, expecting to see a line or a rope or something that will get her safely to the ground, but there’s nothing. In the dim, late night light, she can see Lexa clambering down the wall with no aid, catlike and confident. It’s impressive enough that Clarke pauses, awed by the grace of the other girl’s movements, but then reality comes crashing down on her when she realises that _she’s_ going to have to climb down the wall, too. Clarke swallows hard, knowing that she’s not going to be able to copy Lexa’s movements. Not in a million years.

But it’s not like she has much of a choice. The security guard’s footsteps are growing louder, and she can hear him talking into a walkie talkie, telling someone to call the police. If she doesn’t go out the window, she’s going to get caught, and that just doesn’t bear thinking about.

Gritting her teeth, Clarke swings herself over the ledge and out into the cool night air. For a moment, she grips onto the ledge with stiff fingers, afraid of moving even an inch and dropping onto the hard concrete below, but then she sees the man’s face appear in the doorway. She’s not out of the woods yet. Clarke is quick and cunning, but even a brief glance at this man shows that he’s a lot stronger than her — it wouldn’t take much effort on his part to haul her back into the building, to wait for the police to arrive and put her in cuffs. From there, it’s only a short leap for the police to find out about all of her criminal activities, and that would mean the end of life as she knows it.

Clarke takes a deep breath, closes her eyes, and starts to climb down the wall.

It’s not as difficult as it looked at first; the brickwork is old, and there are plenty of places for her to lodge her hands and feet while she makes her way down to the ground. But it’s not a precise act. Pieces of the wall flake away at her touch; her foot snags in branches that have somehow sprouted from the bricks. She has to take it slowly, carefully, and she makes it about halfway to the ground before everything goes to hell.

Then she misses the wall with her right foot; caught-off guard by the sudden absence of brick beneath her foot, she loosens her grip, and after a minute of desperately trying to regain her balance, she falls to the ground below. She lands with a sickening crack and has to resist the urge to scream as a shooting pain strikes her leg.

She tries to move, but the pain is agonising. Standing is out of the question. She’s not even sure if she’s going to be able to stay conscious — the world is already starting to swim in front of her eyes. Her vision is fading out when she sees a figure kneeling in front of her. She swats at it, her own pathetic form of self-defence when she’s too broken to do anything more effective. Her hand makes contact with something, and then she hears an exasperated sigh.

“Clarke,” someone hisses. “Stop it, I’m trying to help you.”

Lexa. She’s still here, hasn’t run off to get away from the cops, who are no doubt heading this way right now. There’s not a chance in hell of Clarke managing to evade them in the pain she’s in, but Lexa could still leave. Clarke doesn’t want to be responsible for another thief getting caught out. She tells Lexa this, or tries to, at least, but the pain makes her words come stilted and wrong. Lexa seems to understand though. Her face suddenly appears in front of Clarke’s swimming vision, and Clarke can just barely tell that her eyebrows are knitted together with concern. She looks pretty when she’s worried. Clarke thinks about telling her that, but settles for telling her once again that she should leave.

“Don’t be an idiot,” Lexa snarls. “Come on, don’t pass out on me. My ride is coming. We’ll take you to the hospital and get that leg looked at, alright? Come on, Clarke, stay awake.”

She tries, but the pain is too much. The world fades out just a few moments after Lexa promises to help, and then there’s only blissful darkness.

* * *

“Shit,” is all Anya can say when Lexa drags Clarke to the car, trying as best she can to support her injured leg.

Lexa can hardly blame her; Clarke looks like hell. Her skin is washed out and pale, her palms torn up and scratched from the way she landed on the pavement, and her leg… her left leg is twisted at an angle that Lexa’s fairly certain isn’t humanly possible. The fabric of her pants is torn, revealing more pale skin, more scarlet blood than Lexa’s ever seen in her life, and there’s the faintest glimmer of white bone poking through flesh.

“We have to get her to the hospital,” Lexa says, breathing coming in raggedly as Anya throws open the car door and helps her lift Clarke inside.

“Is she dead?” Anya asks, blunt as always. “Because if we show up with a dead body in the backseat—”

“She’s not dead,” Lexa snaps. “She fainted, that’s all. She’s going to be fine.”

She has to be, or Lexa will never forgive herself. This is her fault, after all. She shouldn’t have assumed that Clarke had the same skills as her — not everyone can climb up and down walls as easily as walking up a flight of stairs. Lexa saved herself first and didn’t spare a thought for how Clarke could get out of the building. She _needs_ her to be okay.

She sits in the back with Clarke while Anya speeds to the hospital, just in case the blonde wakes up. She doesn’t, though her chest still rises and falls and when Lexa holds a hand above her mouth, she can feel the hot puff of her breath, so things aren’t as dire as they could be. Lexa hopes they’ll stay that way.

“We need a story,” Anya says, tearing through a light as soon as it flashes green.

“What?” Lexa says, barely paying attention, eyes fixated on Clarke’s leg.

“I said we need a story. Something to tell the people at the hospital. We can’t exactly say she broke her leg breaking into an office building, Lexa.”

“Right. Sorry.” She thinks for a moment. “She’s my girlfriend. We were hanging out at my place and she slipped and fell off the balcony. We were too freaked out to wait for an ambulance.”

“Alright,” Anya says, though she sounds doubtful. “Do you even know her name, though?”

“Clarke,” Lexa says. It dawns on her that it’s been less than an hour since they exchanged names in the hallway, but it feels like a lifetime ago.

“Last name, Lexa? This is stuff that girlfriends are supposed to know.”

“Shit. I didn’t think—hang on.”

Careful not to disturb Clarke’s leg, Lexa removes the headset that seems permanently fused to her head, fiddling with it until she’s pretty sure that she’s turned it on. She fits it atop her head, wincing a little at the crackling static, and then there’s a voice in her ear, a man’s, or maybe more of a boy’s, because it doesn’t sound like he’s long out of puberty.

“Clarke, thank God, are you okay?”

“Hi,” Lexa says, awkwardness washing over her. “Uh. This — this isn’t Clarke. She’s going to be okay, but I need your help.”

“Who is this?”

“My name’s Lexa,” she says. “Clarke might have mentioned me. We’ve been running into each other a lot — anyway, that’s not important. Listen, we had to make a break for it so we wouldn’t get caught by the cops, but Clarke got hurt. She’s going to be okay,” she adds quickly, alarmed at the sharp intake of breath on the other end of the line. “Really, she’s passed out and she’s probably broken her leg, but it’s nothing life threatening. My friend is driving us to the hospital right now, but we need to know some stuff for them to admit her.”

“Why should I trust you?” the voice on the other end says, sounding suspicious and afraid at the same time. “How do I know you’re not just trying to get information on Clarke so you can turn her in?”

Lexa closes her eyes. “Believe that if you want, but if you don’t tell me what I need to know, we’re just going to have to drop her off at the nearest emergency room, alone. I’d _like_ to stay and make sure she gets the treatment she needs, but…”

She trails off, but her implication is clear. After what seems like an eternity, the voice on the other end responds once more.

“Her name is Clarke Griffin,” he says, relenting. Lexa fumbles for her phone to take notes. “Blood type A+. She’s nineteen…”

“Thank you,” Lexa says when he’s finished at last. “I’m going to make sure she’s looked after, okay?”

“You better,” he replies, sounding moody. “Hey, what hospital is it? She’ll want us there when she wakes up. Her friends.” He says the last part pointedly, like he’s trying to remind Lexa that she’s no one to Clarke, and she feels a jolt of annoyance. Still, she lets it slide without comment; he’s worried, after all.

Lexa gives him the name of the hospital and tells him how to recognise her and then clicks off the headset, feeling wearier than she has in weeks. The thought of her nice, warm bed, so in reach when she finished planting the folder in the dentist’s office, now seems like something from another life. All she can think of now is Clarke’s injury and her own guilt. In a small effort to distract herself, she reads the notes that Clarke’s friend gave her, familiarising herself with the little details that their lie is going to rest on.

She and Anya carry Clarke inside when they finally reach the hospital, but they’ve barely made it through the double doors before they’re accosted by two people wearing dark blue scrubs.

“What happened here?” one of them asks, while the other carefully levers Clarke onto a gurney.

Lexa runs through the story that she prepared in the car, hoping that it’s convincing enough to avoid further questions. To her relief, no one presses her for more information, they just wheel Clarke’s gurney through another set of double doors. A receptionist gives Lexa a form to fill out, and then she and Anya take a seat in the waiting area.

Lexa’s able to fill in most of the details on the form thanks to Clarke’s friend, though she falters a little on the insurance information. In the end, she leaves it blank; Clarke can fix it when she wakes up, and it’s not as though everyone knows the details of their significant other’s insurance policy. She hands the clipboard back to the receptionist and then returns to Anya’s side, who’s starting to look more than a little antsy.

“I don’t understand why we’re staying,” she mutters out of the corner of her mouth. “It’s not like you know this girl. And her friends are coming, didn’t you say?”

“They’re coming,” Lexa says, frowning. “Look, you don’t have to stay. I just… I feel responsible. I’m the one who led her to the window. I didn’t wait to see if she could make it down. She wouldn’t be in this mess if it wasn’t for me.”

“I’m not leaving _you_ here alone,” Anya says, rolling her eyes. “Bleeding heart. But we’re leaving once the friends arrive, right?”

“Right.”

Until then, Lexa busies herself with pestering every doctor that emerges from the double doors for updates on Clarke’s condition, but they never have anything to tell her. The friends arrive a little over fifteen minutes later. There are three of them; a girl with long dark hair and fierce dark eyes, an Asian boy whose features are strained with concern, and a lanky dark haired boy with pale skin and a nose that’s just a little too big for his face. He’s the one who spots her and she half-rises in her seat, unsure if she should approach the group or let them approach her. She’s not unsure for long — the dark haired boy almost trips over his own feet in his haste to get to her.

“Lexa?” he asks, gaze flitting between her and Anya.

“That’s me,” Lexa says. “You’re Clarke’s friends?”

“Jasper,” the boy says. “This is Monty and Octavia. How’s she doing?”

“We haven’t had any updates,” Lexa says, tone apologetic. “They took her through those doors when we got here and had me fill out some paperwork, but they haven’t got anything concrete to tell us yet. I did ask a few of the doctors though, they seem to think she’s going to be okay.”

“What happened?” the other boy, Monty, asks. “She broke her leg?”

Lexa fills them in on what happened as best she can, conscious of the fact that they’re not the only ones in the waiting room. When she’s finished, she’s worried that Clarke’s friends will blame her — she blames herself — but amazingly, they don’t seem to bear her any ill will. If anything, they seem grateful.

“You could’ve just left her there,” Monty says, wrapping an arm around her in an unexpected hug. “Thank you.”

Lexa shrugs, awkward again. “It’s nothing.” Behind her, Anya clears her throat. “Ah, so… since you’re all here, I don’t really think it’s necessary for me and Anya to stay. We didn’t want to leave her alone, but she has all of you, and we don’t even know each other all that well…” She trails off, but thankfully, Octavia rescues her.

“Go,” she says. “Thanks for waiting, but we’ve got it from here.”

“Great,” Lexa says, relieved. Anya gets to her feet.

“I’ll pull the car around.”

“Clarke’s going to want to thank you,” Jasper says suddenly, and Monty nods.

“Yeah, definitely. Does she have your number, Lexa?”

Lexa has to resist the urge to laugh. She and Clarke only exchanged names for the first time tonight — the thought of Clarke having her phone number is ludicrous. Even if she did, she doubts Clarke will want to thank her. If it wasn’t for Lexa, she wouldn’t be in the emergency room right now.

But she wants Clarke to know that she didn’t just leave her here, and that she’s sorry for what happened. She wants to know about when Clarke gets better, too, but she knows she doesn’t really have any right to that. Still, she figures that there’s no harm in leaving a message for when she wakes up, just to say that she was thinking about her.

“Do you have some paper?” she asks Jasper, but it’s Monty who produces a little notebook from his pocket, complete with a tiny pen tucked into the spine. Careful, Lexa tears out a page and scrawls a quick note, adding her number to the bottom as an afterthought.

She doubts Clarke will want to stay in touch, but it can’t hurt to try.

* * *

Clarke wakes in an unfamiliar room, one with white walls and a generic seascape hanging across from her. Her vision is a little blurry, like she’s been asleep for a long time, but she can instantly tell that she’s not at home. She’s in a bed with soft blue sheets, though she’s not lying in a position that’s comfortable in any way — for some reason that she can’t fathom, her leg is hitched up and out of the covers, not tucked safely into the warm cocoon like the rest of her. She frowns and twitches her toes, trying to move it beneath the blanket, but receives only a jolt of pain for her efforts. Then her vision focuses, and she realises that her leg is suspended by a hook from the ceiling, and it’s almost entirely encased in bright, white plaster.

The memory of the accident comes flooding back and Clarke closes her eyes again, stomach turning. So she got caught, then. The cops have brought her here to the hospital so that she can recover, and once it’s safe to move her, she’s going to be processed. They’ll find out about all of her criminal activities and she’ll go to jail.

All of a sudden, she feels very scared and alone.

Though not for long — the murmur of voices filters through the half open door, and then Jasper, Monty and Octavia appear, looking a lot more haggard than they did the last time Clarke saw them. They’re carrying cups of vending machine coffee and the boys have five o’clock shadows, and Octavia’s hair looks as though it hasn’t been washed in days. Despite her fear, Clarke is happy to see them.

And they look happy to see her, too. Monty’s the first to notice that her eyes are open, his lips tugging into a grin when they lock gazes.

“You’re awake!” he says, setting his coffee down on a table and coming over to give her an awkward, one-armed hug. “God, it’s good to see you.”

“You too,” Clarke murmurs, her voice muffled by his shoulder. Jasper and Octavia come forward for hugs, too, though Octavia pinches her arm just to let her know that she’s not off the hook for putting herself in danger.

They close the door at Clarke’s request, and then the others gather around her bedside like it’s some kind of vigil.

“So,” Jasper says, “what do you remember?”

She fills them in on what happened before the accident — running into Lexa, the security guard discovering them, Lexa’s escape route. Things get a little fuzzier when she reaches the part where she climbed out the window. Fear, adrenaline, or maybe the pain of what happened to her leg clouds her memory a bit. She knows that she almost made it down the wall, and that her fall happened just a few feet above the ground. All things considered, she’s lucky.

“I guess that’s when they found me,” she finishes, voice turning gloomy. “Have they talked to you yet? They don’t know that you’re involved, do they?”

“They?” Octavia repeats, wrinkling her nose. “Clarke, who are you talking about?”

“The cops,” Clarke says, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. She looks at each of her friends in turn, her brows knitting together in confusion. “They’re the ones who brought me here, aren’t they?”

Monty’s eyes light up suddenly and he jabs Jasper sharply in the ribs. “The note, Jasper!”

“Oh yeah!” Jasper digs about in his pocket for a moment, finally producing a piece of crumpled up paper. His cheeks redden slightly. “Er, sorry. I guess I probably should have put it somewhere else…”

He hands it to Clarke, but she just looks down at it, confused.

“I don’t understand,” she says finally. “What is this?”

“It’s from that girl,” Octavia says. “Lexa. She’s the one who brought you to the hospital. She shook Jasper down for your details so she could do your admittance paperwork and everything.”

“She did not ‘shake me down!’” Jasper says indignantly. Octavia rolls her eyes.

“Please, she manipulated you into giving you all of Clarke’s personal details without even _seeing_ you.”

Clarke ignores them and opens the note with fumbling fingers, curious to see what on earth Lexa could have to say to her. The first thing she notices is the handwriting; slanted, neat, though somehow it seems a little uncertain. As if Lexa wasn’t entirely sure if she should be writing a note to her at all. Brow furrowed, Clarke reads.

_Clarke,_

_This is kind of awkward. I don’t know what you’re supposed to say to someone after you’ve kind of broken their leg. Sorry, I guess, for not helping you down the wall first. Hope you’re not too banged up, it looked pretty bad. I’d like to visit you while you’re in hospital, see how you’re doing — if that’s okay. If it’s not, I understand. Anyway, hope it doesn’t hurt too much. That’s probably a dumb thing to say._

The note ends there. She’s signed it off with a simple, looping ‘L’, and just below that, a hastily scrawled phone number. Clarke stares at the piece of paper for a few seconds longer, almost like she’s waiting for more words to appear on the page, but of course, they don’t. All that happens is that Clarke’s vision blurs from looking too intently at Lexa’s words. She swallows, and then folds the note carefully, placing it on the little nightstand beside her hospital bed.

She’s not quite sure how to react to the note, or to the idea of Lexa in general, but she figures that she can deal with it later, after her friends are gone.

“So we’re okay then,” she says, interrupting Jasper and Octavia’s bickering. “No police raids on headquarters? No one knows that I was in that office building?”

“No one knows a thing,” Octavia confirms. “Lexa made sure of it. She said you were her girlfriend and you fell off a balcony.”

“Like I’d be that clumsy,” Clarke says scornfully. “So when am I getting out of here? How long until I’m better?”

“It’s a bad break,” Monty says. “Could be a few months before you’re back on your feet again. You’ll have to stay here for a few weeks and come back once it’s healed, too. They want you to do some kind of physical therapy to make sure the bones set right.”

Clarke’s heart sinks. Months. That’s months where she can’t go out on assignment — months where she’s going to be laid up, useless, a burden. Her disappointment must show on her face, because Jasper offers a sympathetic smile.

“Don’t worry, Clarke,” he says. “You can come work in control with me and Monty until your leg gets better!”

She blinks at him, the prospect of spending long hours cooped up in the van while Octavia goes out to do all of the exciting stuff.

“Jasper,” she says dryly, “believe me when I say, my leg being broken is _not_ the reason that I’m not jumping for joy.”

* * *

About a week after Clarke’s accident, Lexa’s sitting in a coffee shop nursing a mocha when she receives a text from an unknown number. When she opens it, she spends at least five minutes staring dumbly at the screen, although she’s not entirely sure why — it’s not like it’s Shakespeare quality reading material.

It reads, very simply, _Lexa?_

When she regains her senses, Lexa taps out a reply, equally sparse: _Clarke?_

She sets the phone down on the table in front of her and takes a sip of her drink, though her eyes remain fixed on the slim white rectangle. After a few moments, the screen lights up and the phone buzzes against the table. Lexa almost spills her mocha in her haste to pick up the phone.

_Yes, it’s me_ , Clarke’s reply says. _I got your note. Thanks for getting me to the hospital._

Lexa swallows.

_No problem,_ she writes. _It’s not like I was going to just leave you there. I hope it doesn’t hurt too much._

Clarke’s reply is almost instantaneous. _It could be worse,_ the message reads. Before Lexa can reply, the phone buzzes again, another message from Clarke. _You can visit me, you know. If you still want to. I’m on the 3_ _rd_ _floor, Elm Ward. Room 14E._

The thoughts of seeing Clarke in daylight hours, away from the secrecy and adrenaline of their shared profession, is oddly thrilling to Lexa. She finds herself agreeing to come see Clarke tomorrow during visiting hours. It’s a strange situation, she realises as she sets the phone down on the table again — she and Clarke aren’t friends. They barely know one another. The few conversations they’ve shared have consisted of bickering over which of them should get to steal something that they both want. But maybe what happened last week has changed things; there’s nothing quite like making someone break their leg to forge an instant friendship, Lexa thinks dryly.

She spends a lot of the next morning dithering over what to wear, as if she’s going on some kind of date. Lincoln’s remarks keep coming back to her, making her skin flush with irritation, even though she’s alone. Eventually, she decides to go casual, since Clarke is probably going to be wearing pyjamas or a hospital gown. Clad in ripped grey jeans and a cream sweater, Lexa makes her way to the hospital, insides squirming as she remembers the last time she was here.

A nurse directs her to the Elm Ward, which seems to be specifically for patients with severely broken bones; Lexa sees at least seven casts on her way to room 14E. When she reaches it, she hesitates, wondering what the proper etiquette is for visiting an almost-stranger in the hospital — should she knock? Just walk in? She hovers, debating with herself, and she’s so caught up in her own thoughts that she almost doesn’t notice a young doctor approaching her with a wide smile.

“We were all wondering when you’d visit,” he says. Lexa starts, certain that he’s confused her with someone else. He laughs, obviously noticing her confusion. “Lexa, right? Clarke’s girlfriend?”

Too late, Lexa remembers the story that she and Anya concocted when they brought Clarke to the emergency room; she recognises the doctor as one of the ones she pestered for information on Clarke’s condition. Her cheeks flush red and she wonders if Clarke knows about the ruse; if she doesn’t, things could get awkward very quickly, because the doctor is opening the door now and ushering Lexa inside. She widens her eyes frantically at Clarke once inside, hoping with everything she’s got that Clarke’s smart enough to go along with it, even if she doesn’t know what’s going on.

“Good afternoon, Clarke,” the doctor says warmly, retrieving the chart at the end of her bed and scanning it quickly. “You’re looking a lot better today. I suppose it was because you knew Lexa was coming, right?”

Clarke’s eyes flicker to Lexa’s, confusion clouding her gaze momentarily. Lexa gives the smallest, most imperceptible nod that she can, praying that Clarke understands. Amazingly, she does.

“Right,” Clarke says after a long pause. She smiles, and Lexa’s a little bit taken aback, because she really does have a _lovely_ smile — she should use it more often. “I’ve been dying to see her all week.”

The doctor laughs. “I’d imagine she felt the same,” he says, a teasing note entering his tone. “You should have seen this one when you were admitted, Clarke,” he adds, tilting his head towards Lexa with an exaggerated wink. “Constantly asking all of us if you were going to be okay, when she could see you. It was all quite sweet, really.”

Lexa flushes. Put like that, she does sound like some kind of dumb, lovestruck teenager, but that’s not what it was about. It was guilt — concern, too, but a lot of it was guilt, and Lexa doesn’t have such a high opinion of herself that she feels the need to deny that. She blamed herself for Clarke’s injury and needed to know if she was going to be alright. It doesn’t mean anything more than that.

But she has to keep up the ruse, at least while the doctor’s here, so she forces a smile of her own.

“I’m a worrier,” she says. She realises suddenly that she’s not standing right. She’s hovering a few feet away from Clarke’s bed like some kind of stranger (which is exactly what she is, when it comes down to it) but a loving girlfriend who obsessively pesters doctors about whether or not her partner is going to be okay wouldn’t stand like this. She avoids Clarke’s gaze as she approaches her bedside, hoping she won’t mind when Lexa takes her hand.

To her credit, Clarke responds instantly, curling her fingers around Lexa’s and looking up at her with that lovely, unexpected smile.

“You worry too much,” she says. Lexa’s amazed — she makes it sound like they’ve known each other forever, like she’s far too used to Lexa’s bad habits. Relief mingles with the amazement as the doctor smiles at them again, shaking his head just a little, as if he finds them adorable. It’s working. He’s buying it.

They have to keep up the charade for a few more minutes while the doctor asks Clarke some questions and looks over her chart some more, but eventually, he leaves them alone, though not before dropping a wink and reminding Lexa that Clarke shouldn’t exert herself too much. The comment makes Lexa blink.

“Does he think I’m going to ravish you in your hospital bed?” she says, incredulous. “How would that even _work_ with that cast—” She suddenly realises what she’s saying and her cheeks flush again. It shouldn’t be awkward, but Lexa’s slowly realising that she wouldn’t be entirely opposed to the idea of ravishing Clarke, and those probably aren’t the kind of thoughts she should be having about someone she hardly knows. She takes the opportunity to release Clarke’s hand and steps back so that they can look at one another, though there’s no avoiding the awkward tension in the air. “Um,” Lexa says, wondering what she can even say after the debacle that’s just taken place. “Hi.”

* * *

Maybe it’s the fact that Lexa saved her from being arrested, or maybe Clarke is just a sucker for a pretty face, but when Lexa walks into her hospital room, she doesn’t feel the flash of irritation that her presence used to bring. A few days ago, pretending to be her girlfriend would have been Clarke’s own personal nightmare, but now, it doesn’t seem so terrible. Holding her hand feels easy, natural; talking to her as though they’ve been together for a long time is slightly less so. Lexa’s not as good of an actress as Clarke is, but she tries, and in the end she does a decent job of convincing Dr. Nealon that they’re together. When the doctor finally leaves, though, the mask slips and awkwardness creeps in.

“Hi,” Lexa says, fidgeting uncomfortably with the sleeve of her sweater.

“Hi,” Clarke returns. “Um. There’s a chair over there, if you want to…”

“Oh! Right. Yeah. Yes,” Lexa says, almost babbling. She drags the chair over to Clarke’s bedside; not too close, but close enough that they’re not shouting at one another from across the room. When she’s settled, she drags a hand back through her hair — down, the first time that Clarke’s seen it that way. It falls around her face in soft waves, making her look younger and more vulnerable than Clarke’s ever seen her. It’s nice, Clarke observes, stomach fluttering just a little.

They sit in silence for a few moments, neither one of them quite sure of how this conversation is supposed to proceed.

“Thank you,” Clarke says at last.

“For what?” Lexa says, sounding genuinely surprised.

“For bringing me here. I know that you didn’t have to do that. You could have just left me there. And don’t say that you couldn’t have,” she adds quickly when she sees Lexa open her mouth to respond. “Whatever you want to say about the thieves’ code or basic human decency, we both know that you didn’t have to do it. So thank you.”

Lexa looks like she wants to argue, but she doesn’t. Instead, she just gives a small nod, barely noticeable. “Any time,” she says. There’s a pause and then she sighs, shaking her head. “I don’t really know what I’m meant to say here.”

Clarke frowns, feeling oddly hurt. If Lexa doesn’t want to be here, why did she bother coming in the first place? “You’re the one who said you wanted to visit.”

“I did,” Lexa says, and then hastily amends it, “I _do_. I wanted to see you and make sure that you were okay. I just…” she trails off, biting her lip. “I can’t handle you thanking me like that. The only reason you’re here in the first place is because I fucked up the escape plan.”

“What on earth are you talking about?”

“The window,” Lexa explains. “I knew my way out, I’ve done that a thousand times before, it’s not _hard_ for me. When that guy found us, I went with my gut and did what I’ve always done. I just assumed that you had the exact same skill-set as me — no, that’s a lie, I didn’t even stop to think about whether you did or not. I just jumped. I left you there. If I’d helped you out of the window first, you wouldn’t have broken your leg in the first place.” She sighs. “You shouldn’t be thanking me, Clarke, you should be blaming me.”

Clarke blinks at her, taken aback by the speech. It’s the most she’s ever heard Lexa speak, and she sounds so… earnest. She can tell that the guilt is genuine. Somehow, that just makes Clarke like her more.

“The way I see it,” Clarke says carefully, “every thief worth her salt should be able to climb a wall. Locks have always been my thing — I never bothered to learn how to do the other stuff. It’s not your fault that I don’t know how to do my job right.”

The attempt at humour works; Lexa’s lips quirk upwards, just slightly.

“Come on, Clarke.”

“I’m being serious,” Clarke insists, and she is. She doesn’t blame Lexa for what happened, not even a little bit. If Lexa hadn’t brought her to that window, then sure, maybe her leg wouldn’t have been broken — but the security guard would have caught her, and maybe Clark would be in a jail cell instead of a hospital bed.

Lexa looks like she wants to argue some more, but she doesn’t; she changes the subject to Clarke’s friends instead, clearly trying to dissipate the awkwardness in the air. Clarke doesn’t mind. A lighter topic might be just what they need to move past this strange, unexpected situation that’s brought them together, and get them to the point of an actual conversation. She finds that she’s eager at the prospect.

That turns out to be exactly the case, and once Lexa’s not bemoaning her role in Clarke’s accident anymore, she turns out to be a great person to have a conversation with. The words flow easily between them as they discuss friends, family, what they think of the city (they’re both from elsewhere.) Clarke already knows that Lexa’s wit is sarcastic, her words biting, but now that they’re not in a situation where they’re competing against one another, there’s a clear warmth to the way that she speaks, and when she talks about the people in her life, her affection for them is almost blinding.

More than once, Clarke thinks about how surreal it is that they’re here at all, that their paths have led them both to this place, in this time. It’s more than a little bit strange to be talking to Lexa like this after months of running into one another on assignments, but she finds that it’s a strangeness that she could get used to. Lexa’s _fun_ _—_ even more than that, she’s someone who Clarke can talk about work with, someone outside of the tiny circle that currently only includes Jasper, Monty, and Octavia.

It also doesn’t hurt that Lexa’s pretty, and seems to get prettier the more that Clarke learns about her. It’s as if each personal anecdote makes her features shine that much brighter. When Lexa tells her about how she met her roommate, Anya, Clarke notices the way that Lexa’s hair shines in the light streaming in through the window. When she talks about her childhood, Clarke notes the perfect cupid’s bow of her upper lip. When she reveals the story of how she dropped out of college to become a cat burglar, Clarke’s distracted by how green her eyes are.

She’s so engrossed in learning every detail of Lexa’s face and life that she barely notices the time passing, and only realises that visiting hours have come to an end when an orderly pokes her head through the door to remind Clarke that it’s almost time for dinner. Lexa seems startled by the revelation of how much time has passed as well, and apologises to the orderly, getting to her feet with a slight blush on her cheeks.

“This was fun,” Clarke says when the orderly is gone. “Really. Thanks for coming.”

“Thanks for letting me,” Lexa says. She hesitates. “Is it… would it be weird for you if I came back?”

Clarke smiles, hard enough that it hurts. “Not at all.”

* * *

Lexa takes to visiting Clarke twice a week, and every time, the walk down the hospital’s green linoleum floored hallway feels just as surreal as it did the first time.

It’s hard enough to believe that Clarke doesn’t hold any kind of grudge against her for her accident — harder to believe that somehow, the two of them have become friends. Good friends, too, swapping stories about the past and their lives now and what they want their lives to become. When she’s not focused on a job, Clarke turns out to be surprisingly chatty, and though her smiles are still relatively rare, she always has one ready for Lexa when she arrives.

And if Lexa’s heart picks up pace just a little when she sees it, or if her palms start to sweat when Clarke says her name, warm and welcoming, well, that’s just another thing to add to the list of surreal happenings in Lexa’s life.

She’s not sure when she started having feelings for Clarke instead of just seeing her as an attractive, irritating rival, but she knows that they’re there, no matter how stubbornly she tries to avoid them. Part of her says that it’s just the close friendship that they’ve struck up since Clarke broke her leg, but another, more irksome part of her whispers that maybe she’s felt like this since the very first time they ran into one another at Dante Wallace’s mansion; that maybe Lincoln was right, and all of the irritation she felt before was just misguided attraction. Either way, Lexa decides that it doesn’t matter. The end result is still the same; she’s falling hopelessly, head over heels in love with Clarke Griffin.

She can never quite tell if Clarke feels the same — the staff still think that they’re together, so sometimes, at Clarke’s insistence, she finds herself holding Clarke’s hand, or perching on the bedside instead of in a chair beside it. It feels wonderful, especially because Clarke plays the part so well, just like she did on that first day. But then reality comes creeping back in, and Lexa remembers that it’s all a ruse, and she has to distance herself from Clarke before she gives herself away. Sometimes she catches herself thinking that Clarke feels the same, but then, Clarke is such a good actress — Lexa doesn’t know how she could even begin to tell the real feelings from the fake. So sometimes, it’s harder to deal with her feelings than she’d like. Sometimes it cuts her right to the bone.

When Clarke finally gets her release papers, Lexa can’t help but feel a pang — this is the end, she assumes, though when she mentions on the day of her last visit that she’ll miss their conversations, Clarke looks at her as if she’s grown an extra head.

“You’ll still visit when I’m home?” she says, like the very idea of Lexa stopping her visits is unthinkable. Lexa’s stomach pools with warmth.

“Of course,” she says, as if the idea had never occurred to her.

Clarke goes home on a Thursday, and spends most of the weekend surrounded by family and other well-wishers. Lexa stays away, knowing that if she puts in an appearance, there will be questions — who is she? How does she know Clarke? These are questions that she can’t answer, because Clarke’s family don’t know what she does for a living. It’s best for everyone if Lexa just stays away.

By Monday, though, Clarke’s family have flown back home. Her friends, she informs Lexa in a text, are hard at work obtaining clients and assignments for Octavia, who’s taking on Clarke’s workload as well as her own while Clarke recovers. Safe in the knowledge that she won’t face any tricky questions about their relationship, Lexa sets out for Clarke’s apartment with chicken noodle soup and a box of crackers. If there’s one thing her mother taught her — and her mother didn’t teach her much — it’s that all illnesses, ailments, and injuries can be healed with chicken noodle soup and crackers.

Clarke’s apartment is on the fourth floor of one of the older downtown buildings, the kind of place that attracts hipsters and pretentious artist types. It’s the first apartment she sees when she steps out of the elevator, and it only takes a light rap of her knuckles on the door before she hears Clarke shuffling, heavy-footed with her cast, to answer it.

“Hi,” Clarke says brightly, manoeuvring herself awkwardly to the side so that Lexa can step inside. “So how was your weekend?”

“Eventful,” Lexa says, setting the soup and crackers down on the coffee table. She takes a moment to glance around Clarke’s apartment — it’s decorated in a homey kind of style, with mismatched chairs, patchwork blankets draped over the furniture, candles sitting on every available surface. It’s not what Lexa would have expected, but it’s cosy and welcoming, and when she takes a seat on the worn old couch, she thinks it might be the most comfortable thing she’s ever sat on. “I had a museum job. This rich old lady died and donated all of her valuables to the museum, but her daughters were convinced they were owed some of her jewellery. They wanted me to get it for them.”

“And did you?”

“Of course,” Lexa says, fixing Clarke with a look. “Do you even have to ask?”

Clarke sighs. “I miss it,” she says mournfully, throwing herself onto the couch beside Lexa. Her crutches clatter to the ground, forgotten. “I know it’s only been a few weeks, but God, there’s nothing like it, is there?”

“Sex,” Lexa says, before she can stop herself. Clarke looks at her with an arched brow, making her blush. “Sorry. Actually, I’m not sorry. It’s true.”

“I miss that, too,” Clarke says after a beat. “It’s been a while. Although it’s not like I could do anything _fun_ with this thing, anyway.” She raps at her cast with her knuckles, heaving another sigh.

“It’ll be off soon,” Lexa says, though she pauses then, unsure of what else to say. _Soon you can have all the sex you want (preferably with me?)_ It hardly seems appropriate.

“I guess,” Clarke says, though she doesn’t sound convinced. She shakes her head. “Whatever. Do you want to watch a movie?” She fumbles on the couch cushions for a moment and then holds up a remote. “Perks of being back in my own house. I’ve got my Netflix account again.”

It’s a different afternoon than the ones they’ve spent together before — instead of talking endlessly, they watch cheesy eighties romcoms and shout at the characters for making poor decisions. When they run out of those, they switch to the nineties, and alternate between praising and criticising the fashion choices. It’s comfortable and easy in a way that their conversations in the hospital weren’t, and when the sun is starting to dip below the horizon outside the window, Lexa realises that she doesn’t want to leave. Not now, maybe not ever. She wants more days like this with Clarke, more days to laugh with her and get to know her. More days to _be_ with her.

Belatedly, she realises that Clarke has shifted closer to her on the couch. Their sides are pressed together now, and Lexa can hear the soft sounds of Clarke’s breath, closer to her ear than strictly necessary for a movie day between friends. For a moment, she defaults to that old excuse, that Clarke is simply trying to keep up the charade for the doctors. But there are no doctors here. They’re alone in Clarke’s apartment, and there’s no one here to see this display but them. She’s wondered about Clarke’s feelings before, but for the first time, she dares to hope that she’s not imagining things.

“Clarke?” Lexa says, voice quiet, almost inaudible over the hum of the television.

“Hmm?”

Clarke turns her head to the side, smiling, and in the end, that’s what finally does it — that slow, soft smile, the one that Lexa’s grown so fond of over the last few weeks. That’s what makes her think that maybe she’s wrong, but she’ll never be able to forgive herself if she doesn’t at least try to find out.

Hesitant, she leans in and kisses Clarke right on her smiling mouth, her heart thudding heavily in her chest, her palms starting to sweat as she wonders if she’s misread the signals. There’s a heart-stopping moment where Clarke doesn’t respond, but then Clarke’s lips start to move against hers, and Lexa’s entire body fills with relief.

Clarke kisses the way that she argues, insistent and determined. Even though Lexa’s the one who initiated the kiss, somehow, she feels as though Clarke is in control. Oddly enough, she doesn’t mind. She brings her hand up to trace the soft curve of Clarke’s jaw, hardly daring to believe that this is actually happening.

When she draws back, she’s more than a little bit breathless.

“I’ve wanted to do that for a while,” she confesses. Clarke laughs.

“I’ve wanted you to do that for a while,” she says. “What took you so long?”

“I thought — in the hospital, I thought it was just for show. To make the staff believe the story I told them when you were admitted.”

“It started that way,” Clarke admits, “but things changed pretty fast. Why did you think that I kept asking you to visit?”

Lexa shrugs. “I didn’t. Mostly I was fixating on the fact that you _wanted_ me to visit.”

Clarke blinks at her and laughs, leaning in to capture another kiss. “You’re adorable,” she says fondly. “Really.”

* * *

It’s Clarke’s first assignment since she broke her leg, and she’s never been happier to be out on a job.

The doctors gave her the all-clear a few weeks ago (for physical activity — Clarke’s career is still carefully under wraps, thanks to Lexa’s clever lies and Clarke’s considerable acting skills), but Jasper and Monty forbade her from going out until they were certain that she was fit enough to make a getaway if she needed to.

“No arguments, Clarke,” Jasper said when she protested. “You’ll wait until you’re a hundred percent and until then Octavia can handle your workload.”

Ordinarily it would have taken more to get Clarke to take orders from Jasper, of all people, but there was something about the concern in his voice that made her listen. So she sat back and waited, impatiently. Jasper and Monty tried to get her interested in helping to direct Octavia from the van, but somehow Clarke found that infinitely more depressing than just sitting things out altogether — knowing that Octavia was out there having all the fun while she was trapped with a bunch of beeping monitors made sitting on the sidelines that much harder.

But Jasper and Monty have finally conceded that she’s good to go; she’s moving around on her leg just like she used to before the accident, and the doctors have assured her that there’s no lasting damage to her nerves or muscles. Finally, she’s back to her old self, and tonight’s the night that she gets to go back to doing what she loves. There’s nothing standing in her way anymore.

Except, of course, a certain brunette cat burglar, who’s waiting for her with a sly smirk when she reaches the museum that she’s supposed to breaking and entering tonight.

“Well, look who’s back in the game,” Lexa quips, coming forward to wrap her arms around Clarke’s waist. She leans in for a quick kiss, lips catching the corner of Clarke’s mouth. There’s a twinkle in her eyes when she pulls away. Clarke’s distracted, but only momentarily — things have changed in the last few months, but not so much that she doesn’t remember how frustrating it used to be to bump into Lexa on an assignment.

“What are you doing here?” Clarke demands, afraid that Lexa’s here to grab the same old museum tablet that she’s here for. That was frustrating enough when they were little more than petty rivals — now that they’re dating, she imagines it might put somewhat of a strain on their relationship.

“I asked Monty to tell me when you were heading out again,” Lexa says, giving a slight shrug of her shoulders. “I thought maybe you could use a hand.” She grins. “You wouldn’t be opposed to me helping out, would you?”

Clarke blinks, uncertain of how to respond. “Um.”

“Not that you need any help,” Lexa hastens to add, “but I figured we could try out the partners in crime thing. It could be like date night. Or if you want, we could make a competition out of it.” When Clarke still looks uncertain, she raises an eyebrow. “Unless you’re worried that I’ll be _better_ than you…”

It’s the right thing to say. Clarke narrows her eyes, her competitive streak winning out, like it always does. “You’re on.”

And then she’s off, Lexa trailing behind her with a knowing smile.


End file.
